Almost everyone has heard of such a concept as the psychology of the masses. What is it? It is well known that the personal psychological characteristics of an individual have little in common with how the same individual behaves in a crowd. With the accumulation of large masses, people become more susceptible to external influences, which willingly use the policies of all countries. A peaceful and calm family man in a matter of minutes becomes a radical, for whom there are no rules and norms, there is only one idea. In a crowd, a person becomes depersonalized, loses the ability to reflect.
These and many other questions are dealt with by such a direction in science as the psychology of the masses. Let’s try to answer why the person is depersonalized in a crowd of people. In situations where the individual is alone, he is aware of his responsibility for the actions, and, therefore, ponders them, calculates all the possible consequences. When a person enters the crowd, he acquires the illusion of invincibility and impunity. The herd instinct also pushes to commit those acts that the individual would never have committed in everyday life. A person simply dissolves in the crowd, and the collective unconscious appears.
Similar questions excited even the ancient philosophers, but Sigmund Freud proposed a complete and in-depth study of this topic. "The psychology of the masses and the analysis of the human" I "" is one of the most interesting and popular works of the great founder of psychoanalysis.
Let us consider in more detail what specific characteristics the collective mind has. First, the crowd needs a strong and confident leader. With its help, a lot of people get an idea. The goal unites the crowd even more, and the path to it can even lie through violence and cruelty, which is essentially unacceptable for each individual person. Why is a leader necessary? In fact, the masses are not self-confident, they do not know where to move. A crowd of people needs a person who can infect them with their confidence and unwavering faith in an idea that reaches fanaticism.
The psychology of the masses is also characterized by the fact that the main goal must be extremely simple so that all individuals accept it. The collective unconscious is the totality of all personalities, among which there are many differences. The idea should be so simple that it is understood by both the most intelligent and the most stupid person in the crowd.
Pay attention to the speeches of people who actually had magical influence on the masses. Of course, the most famous of them are Stalin and Hitler. All their speeches were carefully thought out, however, they were distinguished by short, simple and capacious phrases that were close to each person.
The psychology of the masses also has the following important characteristic, which was mentioned at the beginning of the article. A person who finds himself in a crowd feels his own anonymity, the correctness of all his actions, because around there are people who commit similar acts. Logic is being replaced by completely irrational feelings; not mind, but instincts come to the fore.
The psychology of peoples and masses is a science that helps to better understand history. For example, her most recent period was Hitler's rise to power. Many are perplexed why the Germans from completely peaceful citizens turned into real fanatics who are deprived of reflection. The psychology of the masses answers this complex question.
It is worth noting that almost every person is more or less subject to the influence of the crowd. Moreover, most people subconsciously strive for this. A person is drawn to community, to the illusion of complete unification, which, when exposed to interested people and the emergence of a fanatical leader, entails devastating consequences.